Harry Potter and the Silver Spider
by alexandrestone
Summary: Two years after the Voldemort's defeat, Harry Potter is settling into his new life. Finally an Auror, Harry is sad to see the job become so boring. But when an old witch is attacked in a muggle village, the Aurors are forced to investigate a series of gruesome murders that raises more questions than it answers. Who are these new Death Eaters and what do they know about Voldemort?
1. Prologue

Mrs. Pewter sat in her cozy living room, a cup of tea on the nearby table and warm flames in the fireplace. She swayed back and forth in the old family rocking chair made of yew, as a pair of needles clicked and clacked in the air knitting something fierce.

It was a typical evening for her. It had been for the last three years. Warm tea, a skein of yarn and rocking back and forth, regretting and wishing things had gone much differently. But on that warm July day something was about to change for Mrs. Pewter. The first sign she missed were the silent birds that inhabited the nearby forest. The second sign was the flash of green she failed to see as she placed her cup of tea on the table. The last sign, however, was the most obvious. A draft of wind had been picking up ever since the door was left ajar a little earlier when an intruder made his way into Mrs. Pewter's home.

The man, dark hair and bright blue eyes, stood behind Mrs. Pewter just out of sight. He could make this fast and simple but he was enjoying it, truth be told. She would be his third and the anticipation was only rivalled by his desire to appreciate every second before she lay on the floor lifeless.

Still in the back of his mind he knew he had a mission to complete and the more time went by, the more challenges he could encounter.

"_Petrificus Totalus_," he hissed, before walking toward her.

She was on the floor, unable to move, unable to reach her wand. One can never be too careful, he thought before kicking it away. He aimed his wand at her again before whispering "_Mobilicorpus._"

He turned and walked toward the second floor, to her bedroom. Her frozen, floating body followed him.

"You're a bad woman, Mrs. Pewter," he spoke a little louder this time. A little less afraid. "Oh, yes you are."

He pointed to her bed with his wand, and she landed atop the floral-covered duvet, her eyes still screaming for help. The man stared back at her, as if their eyes could understand each other. "No one's coming to help you, Mrs. Pewter. No one at all. Are you scared? You should be," he said, laughing. "I worried that this new appearance might not be suited for the job but I can smell the fear on you."

He looked in the mirror and tussled his dark hair. He licked his lips and then aimed his wand at the immobile body in front of him. He smiled again before speaking the words that she had been dreading to hear.

The man knew he did not have much longer, soon enough a nosy neighbour would give her a ring to ask about the flashes of green light they kept on seeing. He needed to make his exit. He finished up in the room, before he went back downstairs. He paused as he grabbed a pastry from the table and then left the house through the back door. He walked a couple of steps into her backyard, aimed his wand at the grass and whispered a spell before disappearing with a loud crack.


	2. Chapter 1 - Savage

CHAPTER ONE

Savage

It had been two years since Harry started his new job. It was the first time, in as long as he could remember, that he finally felt comfortable. Sure, he had enjoyed his time at Hogwarts but it was always tainted by memories of difficult lonely summers still to come, like a man with a death sentence ahead of him. Even on the best of days, a dark thought was always looming around the corner.

Of course that was nothing compared to the rise of the Dark Lord, which had become a growing threat since he first stepped foot at Hogwarts. It ended in a war that cost Harry friends and family, a price that no one should have to pay.

But since then, Harry had begun assembling his life back piece by piece. He was working for the Ministry of Magic. And now, every time he stepped foot into the building he felt like he belonged. It was fortunate, of course, that he was working with his best friend. Ron Weasley had a desk at the opposite corner of the Auror Office.

Harry was always first to arrive. He was never great at hiding his excitement. Across from his desk was his partner's. Elizabeth Savage was a beautiful blonde 40-year-old woman with black eyeliner that made her green eyes pop. Her skin could only be described as perfect and smelled like flowers. Her stare, on the other hand, had frightened Harry at times as did the stern way in which she talked, but after two years of being partners he knew that her bark was worse than her bite.

When they had been first partnered up Harry was a very different person. Never cocky or self-satisfied, Harry still had managed to gain a certain confidence in his own abilities. It was hard to deny that he had a knack for that kind of thing, it had served him well during the many years he had to face Voldemort. He knew that was the what he wanted to do for the rest of his life.

He was excited when Kingsley Shacklebolt invited him to join the Auror Office, even thought he didn't go back for his last year at Hogwarts. Hermione, of course, had warned him that a lack of education offered no promising future, in the muggle world or otherwise.

"Harry, I'm not saying education is the only path to a better future," she said kindly, once over tea. "But it certainly wouldn't hurt. You never know what you could regret later."

Harry wondered whether Hermione was worried about his future or that of her boyfriend. Ron too had opted against returning to Hogwarts after defeating Voldemort. It was hard for him to not think of Fred whenever the word "Hogwards" was mentioned. Hermione didn't push, accepting that some memories were too painful to avoid. Instead she channeled all her energy toward Harry.

When he accepted the job offer at the Auror Office, he made sure to casually let Hermione know, hoping it would end the discussion about his future. But since Ron had also been offered the same position, Hermione no longer seemed to have much interest in that conversation.

They showed up together their first day and were excited to see Neville waiting outside the office.

Kingsley welcomed them on their first day.

"Thank you for joining me. The Auror Office has bore witness to the growth of many powerful witches and wizards, many of whom you called your friends and fought alongside you in the Battle of Hogwarts," he said, standing tall behind his large desk. "It gives me great pleasure to know that you will follow in their footsteps. Our future is in safe hands."

"My grandmother sends her regards," Neville said. "She's proud of me, she said. Getting the chance to work with you and Harry and Ron. She's impressed."

Ron's cheeks turned as red as his hair. Harry put a hand on Neville's shoulder.

"It's us that should be proud to work with you, Neville," he said, before turning to Kingsley. "Will we all be working together, like a team?"

Kingsley smiled large, flashing his pearly white teeth.

"I'm glad you asked, Mr. Potter. No. I will continue my duties as Minister for the foreseeable future. You, Mr. Potter will be working with Ms. Savage. Mr. Weasley, you're working with our other new recruit, Mr. Wood. And Mr. Longbottom, you'll be partnered with Mr. Proudfoot, who also happens to be the new head of the Auror Office. Be on your best behaviour, he's not one for tomfoolery."

Harry and his friends couldn't help but be a little disappointed with the news at first. As difficult as hunting for horcruxes had been, it would have been unbearable without Ron at his side for most of it. Now they would need to learn how to trust and rely on someone else.

In the two years that followed, Elizabeth Savage had slowly become someone Harry looked up to. She had her faults, of course. She wasn't great at interviewing witnesses and her flying left a lot to be desired. But the elegance with which she could summon spell after spell was mesmerizing. She taught Harry all sorts of tricks with the wand, and even better than that, she taught him the job. To keep an eye out for anything extra-ordinary. Elizabeth Savage had made Harry a better wizard. Harry sometimes thought back to his first day and smiled when he realized he was lucky to have been partnered with Savage, as he called her.

The morning after the murder of Clea Pewter, the Auror office was having a typically calm day. Harry sat at his desk, filing away summons and warnings while his partner was going through the owls sent by people who thought they were being followed or attacked by dark wizards. They usually turned out to be nothing, people still paranoid and afraid of Voldemort's return, but the new Head Auror made it a point to investigate as many complaints as they could. In his estimation, the previous Ministry leadership had failed to see the signs and that would not happen again. Not under his watch.

"Another lady says she saw Voldemort outside her yard," Savage said, rolling her eyes for Harry's amusement. "We'll head over and have a look."

She tossed the letter on her desk, with a bit of frustration. Since Harry defeated Voldemort, slowly the worklo

ad had been decreasing in the Auror Office. Checking out minor complaints wasn't the best use of Savage's time, and she knew it. But there was little else to do.

"We'll take it," Ron jumped in quickly. "If you don't want to, I mean. We could use the walking. Ollie gets difficult when he's stuck at the desk all day. I do too, I guess."

Savage gave Ron a slight nod, and turned to Harry.

"Is that okay with you, Potter?"

"Absolutely," he said, pretending he wasn't completely bored of being in the office. "It's probably nothing anyway."

Shortly after Ron and Oliver headed into the field, Neville came out of Proudfoot's office.

"Boss says he has to meet with Kingsley today. He's fighting to get another team in here, but I guess no one seems to think we're that important anymore," Neville's words raced out of his mouth like scared animal. "Anyway, he said I should tell you that he'll be busy. And I have to pick up Gran and take her to Dawlish's appeal. We both testify tomorrow so we want to be prepared. With Ron and Oliver gone, the Boss wants you two to stay here unless something urgent comes up. So don't bother answering any more owls, I guess. You can't head out to help anyway."

"Thanks Neville," Harry said. "Give my best to your Gran."

"I will, Harry."

When Neville left. Harry and Savage had the office all to themselves. They did some work at first, filling out reports, sending out memos, rewriting some of Ron's reports. It wasn't until mid-afternoon that the day brought its first surprise.

Harry was under his desk, picking up the some parchment paper he had dropped when he heard a familiar voice yell out his name.

"Harry!" Mr. Weasley said. "How are you?"

Harry stood up quickly and walked over to Mr. Weasley, quickly shaking hands.

"Good Mr. Weasley. Uhmm...Ron isn't here. No one's here except us, actually."

Savage stood up from her desk and shook Arthur's hand as well.

"Mr. Weasley, how may we be of service?"

"Thank you, Elizabeth. Yes, well if it's just the two of you then it will have to be you. Mind if I take a seat?" he said.

Harry pulled out a chair for Arthur before sitting on a nearby desk.

"This morning I sent out one of my junior workers, Mr. Seamus Finnigan. I believe he's an old classmate of yours, Harry. In any case, we had picked up some chatter from the police on the little radio we have. It's a marvelous thing, we enchanted it so it autotunes to any station saying one of several keywords. Anyway, they were speaking of this unusual empty house that had a fire that they couldn't seem to put out. They ended up saying the "magic" word so many times I had Seamus pop down there and take a look. He, uhm, convinced local authorities he was taking over the investigation so there is currently no worry of the muggles catching wind of this," Mr. Weasley explained.

Savage took a sip of her tea without breaking eye contact. If anything her eyes narrowed in, like a predator studying its prey.

"He put out the fire. It wasn't too hard for him. He sort of specializes in things that burn and explode. Quite an odd lad. But Mr. Finnigan actually has very good instincts, most of the time. He talked to the neighbours a bit. They all described the owner of the house as a mysterious old lady that disappears from time to time. Like I mentioned, the house is empty. She could be on a vacation, who knows? But the markings in the grass...Well you can take a look at it yourself," he said, as he handed out a photograph to Savage and one to Harry.

Harry studied the picture he was handed. For a brief moment it almost looked like a muggle photo, devoid of any major movement. Upon closer inspection some of the grass in the bottom right corner seemed to sway with the wind. But in the middle of the picture, burned into the yard was a symbol. A flaming skull, with eight legs coming out of its sides. Like a burning spider. But the skull itself looked oddly familiar. He had seen it before. It was on the arm of all the…

"Death eaters," Savage said.

"Perhaps," Arthur replied. "I thought I would leave this up to you to pursue and investigate Anyway, I must be off. We have all sort of meetings with the Minister of Magic. Kingsley is really bringing about important changes. I'll see you around, Harry."

"Thank you, Mr. Weasley," Harry said. "And please tell Seamus I said hello. He did a good job with this."

Harry sat on the desk, even after Arthur left the office. He stared at the picture. It wasn't the same symbol but the similarity couldn't be coincidental.

"What do _you_ think?" He finally asked his partner.

"I think it's time we visit this empty house, Potter," she said.


End file.
